bigtone667 wrote: ↑Mon Nov 13, 2017 7:04 am
I am confused as to why you would get over powered by the longer lines once your kite is set. Is it because the kite sits back a little in the wind window due to the additional line drag?
I fly a Cloud, and the best light wind setup for me is 25 to 30m race lines in super light conditions. I only ever use the short lines (20m) with some decent wind.
I cant feel any difference in power with short versus long lines either, upwind (or downwind) or halfwind.
But when you ride quite powered (racing t.ex) there is a huge difference, as short lines will make you able to avoid long powersweeps so you can in reality ride in a lot more wind now.
Especially because with foil kites you have too much power way too fast for freeriding - when they got the long powersweep.
Going straight it does not mean anything really - maybe if super gusty, but this is never the case in "the lightest of the winds"
And on the other hand, for freeride you WANT the long powersweep and a smaller kite if possible, as it will give you more harmonic turns, a faster kite, and the ability to make foiling jibes more smooth
So exactly as you bigtone, I use short lines (in my world) 26 m when powered, and 30-31 m when light or marginal winds, both with light LEI kites or not too big foil kites.
Some says that when you get up into 18 m2 kites, longer lines does not help ?
I have no idea, but sounds a bit odd though ?
PF